Better Left In The Dark
by V.Evergreen
Summary: Set three days after VOTE SAXON, the team aren't quite sure what to make of the strange alien tech that's fallen though the rift, all they know is Jack said it was called the Toglaphane and despite what else he might say they have to help it. Two-shot.
1. Chapter 1

When Ianto and Gwen had come trudging back through the cog door both soaked to the skin Owen had turned away to try and hide a smug smile. It was meant to have been him on call tonight but the appearance of an unknown alien body had meant that he had been left with the task of the dissection. Not a pleasant task, but a good deal drier. Once he felt sure he wouldn't laugh at the sight of them looking so dejected he turned around.

Gwen was peeling her jacket away from her skin while Ianto settled for sending a murderous look at Owen. Once again it was a struggle to keep the smirk off his face but he was interrupted by Gwen's ranting,

"-bloody waste of time! Wasn't there five minutes before it started chucking it down! Whatever it is next time someone else can go and get it!" Owen watched in mild amusement as Gwen stormed away probably to try and find something slightly less drenched to put on.

With a final smirk to Ianto he was about to go back to the medical bay before another voice stopped him,

"Did you find anything?" This time it was the quiet voice of Toshiko as she leaned away from her computer to get a better look at Ianto.

"Yes, not sure what it is though." Owen turned around out of curiosity to see Ianto heave a heavy looking bag onto a desk. His desk he noted sourly. Still whatever it was in the bag looked heavy for something that had been slung over Ianto's shoulder. He watched on as with two hands Ianto reached into the bag and pulled out what looked like one of the strangest artefacts he had ever seen.

It was roughly the size and shape of a basket ball but from the looks of it a good deal heavier. It didn't look like any sort of metal he had ever seen and even stranger it looked like all of the circuitry was engraved on the outside.

Immediately and as expected Tosh descended on the new technology with a glint in her eye as she rounded the desk to get a better look at it.

She ran a critical eye over it and hovered a tool over it that she'd grabbed over her workspace and looked at the results with a small frown marring her face.

"What is it?" Asked Ianto still looking at the ball of metal as though he expected it to do something. Owen found himself walking forward to hear what Tosh said, intrigued despite himself.

"The readings say… well, it looks like there might be something alive in there. I'm definitely picking up some sort of vital sign." Owen could see his own shock copied on to Ianto's face. It wasn't often live aliens were brought back to the hub and it was even less often that they were brought in by mistake.

"Should we get Jack?" Asked Ianto sounding uneasy. Jack had only been back for four days since he had disappeared on them and refused to say a word about where he'd been. It still felt like they were treading on egg shells when they talked to him; it was like ever since he'd come back something was ever so subtly _off_ about him. Owen wasn't particularly fond of the idea of dragging Jack into the situation, ever since he'd left, the team had become almost self-reliant and he wasn't going to go running to Jack to solve every problem just because he could.

Tosh looked equally torn by the question, she sent a longing look at the door of Jack's office before she took a deep breathe and spoke,

"No, let's just see what we're dealing with." Owen couldn't help but feel a little surprised at that, he thought she'd be the first one to want help with something that she didn't understand.

"What are we dealing with?" Owen turned his head to see Gwen walking towards them in a fresh set of clothes, vainly to wring out her still damp hair.

"Tosh reckons there's something inside it." He said jerking his head to where the metal sphere still sat upon the desk..

"Yeah?" Said Gwen looking interested, "Do you know what it is?" Ianto looked up at her shaking his head before returning his attention to the desk.

Tosh started to run her hands over the sphere as though she were looking for something, at Owen's questioning look she explained,

"I'm looking for a hinge, or seam or _something_." She took a step back still looking at the puzzle in front of her, "If there's something inside it there has to be a way to get it out.

For Owen the whole thing was starting to lose it novelty. From the way Tosh was looking at it he could tell that this was going to become one of her little projects and God knows how long those things lasted. He had just started to turn around to wander back to his lab when a sound made him start violently and whip his head back.

When he looked he saw that everyone else, like him, was frozen to the spot staring at the desk wide eyed.

The sphere emitted another crackling bout of white noise but this time the voice underneath was more discernable.

"Help us! Help us! The darkness is coming!" It spoke in a voice that sounded like a frightened child but none of them could bring themselves to respond.

It was Gwen who eventually made the first move,

"Hello?" She asked in a low and cautious voice as she slowly edged closer to the device, "Hello, can you hear me?"

She got no response from it apart from a light that was flickering on the surface of the metal.

Turning back to the rest of the team she asked them with a frantic voice, "How can we get it out of there? We need to get it out!" She looked at Tosh expectantly as though she knew she had all of the answers.

Tosh on the other hand had picked up another gadget from her desk and was running it over the metal while desperately trying to decipher the data at the same time.

"According to this," she said while still furiously trying to read all of the information her handheld was trying to give her, " The circuitry should open if we can run enough volts though it to override the failsafe."

"So lets do it." Owen looked up surprised to see Ianto standing there with his mouth set into a grim line. He supposed that he shouldn't feel so shocked that Ianto was willing to go along with this, with Ianto's back story it wasn't surprising that the man felt the need to try and help a creature that was encased in cold metal.

"We can't." It was Tosh who spoke this time. They all looked at her but she just stared at the sphere with sorrow in her gaze, "It requires too much energy, we don't have enough power to do it ourselves or to divert it from the grid."

"Please. Please help us." Owen didn't know if it was his imagination or the voice inside the sphere really was getting weaker.

"The rift." Gwen stood there staring at them all with wide eyes as though she expected to be told she was wrong, " Couldn't we use some of the energy from the rift?"

"It's too volatile, it might react badly." Said Tosh still looking at the supposed creature on her desk.

"But we wouldn't need to use much of it!" Gwen insisted looking at the central column of the rift that ran through the hub. The rift that Owen had opened not four months ago, "We can't just leave it there."

All eyes once again returned to the source of all of the debate.

"Jack wouldn't let us." Said Owen his voice curiously flat.

"Jack doesn't have to know." Ianto said as he held the medic's stare. Eventually Owen looked away and the others took it as a sign to move.

Tosh ran to the central rift column and began rewiring with a vengeance while Ianto picked up the sphere and carried it closer to the rift. Gwen stood by the side, watching and biting her thumbnail as she silently urged them on. In less than three minutes the sphere was wired up to the rift and everyone stood by watching nervously as Tosh prepared to flick the switch.

"Are you sure this won't end like the last time we opened the rift?" Owen asked for what felt like the hundredth time but in reality was only the fourth.

"We'll only be using a miniscule amount of it's energy, it shouldn't have any adverse effects." She said once again.

With a last nod from Ianto and an encouraging smile from Gwen Tosh placed the final connecting piece into the circuit.

The effect was immediate.

The first thing to become apparent was the high pitched keening coming out of the sphere. It got louder and louder until it stopped suddenly and with a puff of white smoke that left the whole team coughing and spluttering . Tosh reacted quickly as she snatched the connecting piece out of the circuit and closed down the rift.

Owen waved a hand in front of his face trying to disperse the smoke when he heard a loud and familiar voice sound from the stairs overhead.

"What the _hell_ is going on here?"

_TBC…_


	2. Chapter 2

_The first thing to become apparent was the high pitched keening coming out of the sphere. It got louder and louder until it stopped suddenly and with a puff of white smoke that left the whole team coughing and spluttering . Tosh reacted quickly as she snatched the connecting piece out of the circuit and closed down the rift._

_Owen waved a hand in front of his face trying to disperse the smoke when he heard a loud and familiar voice sounded from the stairs overhead._

"_What the hell is going on here?"_

Distantly Owen could hear the sounds of Jack taking the stairs from the upper level of the hub. He heard but he didn't turn around for something else had entirely stolen his attention.

The once spherical ball had split into what resembled a perverse looking flower. Tosh had pulled back the remaining metal which looked like it had been hinged on and what it had revealed made him want to throw up.

Inside the metal ball sat a disembodied human face, coved with what looked like a respirator. It's skin was old, saggy and grey while it's eyes were faded and rheumy but that wasn't the worst of it. No, what Owen saw that disturbed him so much was the way that the creatures eyes darted about in its pale face as if searching for something that couldn't be found. Its eyes were clouded and old but the speed at which they moved belied any such notion; it was a far cry from the weak child's voice that hey had heard coming from it. Owen looked up into the faces of his team mates and saw his own emotions copied into their faces, Ianto was looking at the new development with what looked like a cross between shock and disgust, Tosh had one hand covering her mouth, not in shock but as if to smother any sound that she might have made and Gwen had one hand half extended as though she wanted to help but had no idea how to go about it as she ignored the tears welling up in her eyes.

"I said, _what_ is going on here?" Jack came to standbetween Owen and Ianto as he looked at each member of his team looking irritated and, if Owen wasn't mistaken, just a little bit worried.

Gwen's soft voice was the one to break the silence, "We found it at the rift sight… we didn't think anything of it, we just brought it back and it started _begging_ for help… how do we help it Jack?" She looked at Jack beseechingly and for the fist time Jack lowered his eyes to the being in question. His reaction shocked everyone.

He took a step back from it so quickly it looked like an automatic reaction. His normally handsome face was twisted until he looked both immeasurably angry and slightly crazed at the same time. However, it was his final reaction that caused the uproar. Quicker than Owen could register, the antique Webley revolver that was permanently hung by Jack's side was cocked and ready to fire and pointed directly at the ailing creature.

The reaction was instantaneous.

Both Ianto and Owen who stood on either side of Jack grabbed his arm and dragged it down to point at the floor, Gwen was shouting at him incomprehensible words and Tosh was quickly trying to put the metal over the old face to protect it from further harm.

"Jack just tell us how to help it!" Shouted Gwen above the sound of the scuffle of keeping the gun pointed away. Owen managed to grab the gun off Jack and keep it out of reach as they stilled and all turned to Jack for answers.

"Help it?" Jack said with a derisive laugh, "You don't help something like that!"

"What is it?" Came the quiet and inquisitive question from Tosh.

"They called themselves the Toglaphane," said Jack with hate and sarcasm dripping off his words in equal measure, "not what they really are, but that's what we called them." No one dared ask further than that for fear of an answer. The face looked definitely human but as long as the answer wasn't confirmed it was easier to deal with.

"Just tell us what we can do to help it, Jack." Jack looked at Gwen with what was almost pity in his gaze.

"Some things aren't meant to be helped, Gwen."

"Why not?" She demanded suddenly angry that he was so unwilling to help what was, in her eyes, obviously defenceless.

His eyes were only sad as he looked back at her, " Ask it what its purpose is." Hesitantly Gwen did so.

"I must protect the paradox machine." The sound of the child's voice was more chilling than before now that they could see what was making it. Ianto and Tosh looked up, confused as Gwen just stared back at the tired old face.

"And what was your purpose before that?" Jack asked sounding oddly calm.

The washed out blue eyes of the Toglaphane continued to dart around the room as though to identify where the voice was coming from, "To kill." It answered simply but with a definite note of glee in it's voice.

A shocked silence reigned over the team, only broken by Jack's voice as he continued to talk, "And why do you do it?"

This time a mad cackle that seemed to chill the room came from the alien, "Because it's fun!" It laughed. Jack just looked at the rest of the team all of whom were trying valiantly and steadfastly avoid his gaze.

"Owen, give me my gun." Jack said calmly but leaving no room for doubt that it was an order. Silently, Owen did so. None of the team watched as Jack took careful aim of the face on the table and then, with no hesitation, pulled the trigger. They all missed the way that his lips quirked into a half smile as he leaned over to get a look at the now dead enemy. All they saw was Jack holster the gun and walk away as though nothing had happened.

As Owen helped Tosh clear away the remains of the now dead creature he couldn't help but wonder what on earth had happened to his boss while he was away, he was never that calloused before he left them but now he had come back he had no problem carrying out a blatant execution. He knew that the rest of the team wished desperately to know where Jack had disappeared off to for those four months, but he could honestly say that if it had damaged his boss that much he hoped to hell and high water that he never had the misfortune of finding out what had happened.

After all, some things are better left in the dark.

…..

A/N- Hope you enjoyed it and thank you for reading! If you liked it (or not) drop me a line in a review, I'd love to hear your opinion, all the best- VE


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